First group of delayed young deportees approved

Sept. 12, 2012 11:18 PMAssociated Press

WASHINGTON -- Less than two months before a presidential election in which both parties are fighting for the key Hispanic vote, the Obama administration has approved the first wave of applications from young illegal immigrants hoping to avoid deportation and get a work permit.

The Homeland Security Department is notifying a small group of people this week that they have been approved to stay in the country for two years as part of President Barack Obama's Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program. The first approvals come just three weeks after U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services started accepting applications for the program that Obama and Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano first announced June 15.

In an internal document obtained by the Associated Press, the government had estimated previously that it could take months for each application to be reviewed and approved. So far, about 72,000 people have applied to avoid deportation.

DHS said background checks, including fingerprinting, are being conducted on each immigrant before an application can be approved. The average wait time for approval is expected to be about four months to six months.

Most applications for immigration benefits take several months for USCIS to process. In certain circumstances, people can pay extra fees to speed up the process. There currently is no such option for deferred action applications.

To be eligible for the program, applicants must have come to the U.S. before they turned 16, be 30 or younger, be high school graduates or in college, or have served in the military. The immigrants could not have a serious criminal record. Successful applicants can avoid deportation for up to two years and get a work permit.

Applicants must pay a $465 paperwork fee that is expected to cover the cost of processing the work permit and fingerprint collection. Homeland Security has estimated that as many as 1.04 million immigrants could apply to avoid being deported in the program's first year, with about 890,000 being immediately eligible. According to the department document, it could cost between $467 million and $585 million to process applications in the first two years of the program, with revenues from fees estimated at $484 million. That means the cost to the government could range from a gain of $17 million to a loss of more than $101 million.